Three days later, Hou Niao entered the Hidden Sword Pavilion. By now, everyone had gone, leaving the place utterly empty; after the bustle of the first few days, it had returned to normal.
Low-level cultivators like them had limited choices in cultivation methods and techniques to begin with. This was the time to build their foundations, and dabbling in too much was no good; learning some complicated, cumbersome techniques now might let them shine brilliantly for a while, but once their cultivation advanced, those techniques would immediately become chicken ribs-of little use, yet a pity to discard-wasting their time for nothing.
Most of these newly admitted disciples were experienced. They knew what they ought to learn and what was not worth wasting time on, so they chose two or three things they lacked and left. Few lingered here, reluctant to leave.
Hou Niao presented his sword token and entered the pavilion without trouble. It was actually a seven-story stone tower. For cultivators like them, who had yet to cross the watershed into Profound Connection, only the first three floors were accessible. Everything above them was forbidden ground.
Among the Quanzhen Sect's branches in the Shan Kingdom, some relatively important cities had five-story Hidden Sword Pavilions. A provincial center like Jincheng had a seven-story sword pavilion; only the Shan Kingdom's capital, Jade Capital, had a true nine-story sword pavilion. That was where the original manuscripts, sole surviving copies, and otherwise unavailable texts were kept. Those elsewhere were merely copies.
The stone tower was spacious and bare, reflecting the overall architectural style of the Shan Kingdom: rugged and ancient, sturdy and durable. Its interior decoration, however, fell more than one grade below that of the Anhe Kingdom. Still, each had its own style, and a simple comparison would not do.
The first floor held cultivation methods, several dozen in all. Many were imports from other schools, offered as options but not recommended; cultivation had ten thousand methods and ten thousand paths. Unless you tried them, how would you ever know which suited you best?
Only five foundational cultivation methods truly belonged to the Quanzhen Sect. Hou Niao examined them carefully, finally understanding what the fundamentals of Daoist learning were. In broad terms, they were much alike, with no fundamental differences.
Having understood this, he no longer hesitated. He would not touch these cultivation methods. His own Dragon-Tiger Convergence and Joining the Same, Tracing the Source were enough to carry his cultivation to Profound Connection. There was no need to change.
His real concern was that changing cultivation methods might make the mysterious vortex disappear!
He was a proper cultivator now, after all, and had his own distinctive understanding of the Dao. He knew very well that the mysterious vortex within his Purple Mansion could not change just because his cultivation method changed. In fact, it would not disappear because he swallowed pills, either. Taking pills merely kept it from manifesting; that did not mean it no longer existed.
He therefore went to the second floor. Here were foundational supplementary methods for low-level cultivators, including the basics of the Dao of Alchemy, the Dao of Talismans, the Dao of Formation, and the Dao of Artifice. Mastering these fields would provide excellent support for sustaining cultivation. Learning alchemy, for example, could mean never lacking pills again; learning to make talismans could add several tenths to one's fighting strength; learning to craft artifacts would allow one to make basic combat equipment. These were all roads to riches.
The prerequisite was that you had to be able to learn them, and learn them well!
The initial investment was enormous. It consumed time and effort, and demanded enduring countless failures before success might finally become possible. For most cultivators, whether they could hold out that long was itself a question.
Only cultivators recognized by a power willing to supply basic materials for them to squander had any prospect of success. Apart from that, there was no other way.
Hou Niao did not believe he had talent in these areas. Even if he did, they were not things he ought to venture into now.
He chose another supplementary method: Sword Net.
Sword Net was not swordsmanship, but the six consciousnesses! It was a set of supplementary means that the Quanzhen Sect's founding master had devised from a sword cultivator's perspective, seeking what best suited sword cultivators: eye consciousness, ear consciousness, nose consciousness, tongue consciousness, body consciousness, and mind consciousness. Together, they formed a net in the mental sense, leaving opponents nowhere to flee within the Sword Net.
The six consciousnesses were hardly something only the Quanzhen Demonic Sect trained. The Daoist Sect trained them, and so did the Buddhist Sect. In fact, disciples of every Xiuzhen sect practiced them. They were the most fundamental of fundamentals, the most practical of practical skills. Whether fighting, exploring, going about daily life, or peeping, they were everywhere.
They let you see farther, hear more clearly, smell more keenly, taste more richly, sense more acutely, and intuit more accurately!
What application of Xiuzhen could fall outside that scope?
The Quanzhen Sect's methods for the six consciousnesses simply leaned more toward combat, more toward the sword. That was where they differed from the Daoist and Buddhist Sects, whose focus lay more in longevity.
This was the only set of methods and techniques he picked up on the Hidden Sword Pavilion's second floor. It was also one most Quanzhen disciples would take. If someone did not, the sole reason was that they had already learned some other technique for the six consciousnesses!
Thus, in the Xiuzhen world, learning a technique for the six consciousnesses did not necessarily let you see farther than others, since everyone had learned one; but if you did not learn one, you would certainly see no farther than a rat!
He leisurely ascended to the third floor, the highest floor low-level cultivators were permitted to enter. This floor held sword techniques, magical techniques, and physical techniques. In short, everything here taught people how to fight.
Sword techniques were the most numerous, with well over a hundred. The Purging the Central Army Sword, Thirteen Returning Geese Slashes, and Cross-Shaped Swift Sword that Daoist Wang had given him were all among them.
Kunwu Sword, Azure Waves Play, Three Lights Divide Shadows, No-Return Sword, Taiji Swift Sword, Big Windmill, Linked Strikes to Slay Generals, Eagle Grappling Technique, Mother-and-Child Yin-Yang Sword, and so on-their numbers were outrageous. Every one was among the finest sword techniques on this continent. Anyone else would surely have been dazzled.
But Hou Niao was not, because in his battle with that Sword Soul in the Soul Realm, he had already grasped a trace of the sword's essence.
In truth, the moves were no longer important. What mattered was the distinctive way each sword technique circulated qi! That was where the essence of every sword technique lay. Once that was mastered, everything else could be freely expressed and given unbridled rein. Just like that Sword Soul: what fixed moves had it used? Everything had been utterly natural, wondrous strokes chanced upon by a master's hand.
Only when every thrust of the sword was fitting and natural, in harmony with its surroundings, each a flash of inspiration, flashing without end, would it be true swordsmanship-swordsmanship that drove others to despair!
He, too, had only managed a single lucky sneak attack after being cut down countless times. Relying on his vastly stronger soul-body energy, he had won without honor.
He had learned the essence of the sword from the Sword Soul, but to realize that essence, not a single fundamental could be missing. He still had to start from the beginning. The Sword Soul could not teach him these fundamentals; he could only seek them in the Hidden Sword Pavilion, in every sword technique!
Taiji Swift Sword, for instance, rounded the qi and Gang throughout the body into circles, seeking within countless large and small circles, within softness and yielding suppleness, the sudden rise of an unexpected force, armored cavalry bursting forth!
Azure Waves Play likened the qi and Gang throughout the body to the tides, wave after wave, without end!
Three-Part Light and Shadow was an illusory sword technique of two feints and one real strike. Of course, once you had trained it deeply enough, you could also use two real strikes and one feint, or three feints and one real strike. In short, the point was not to cling to fixed forms.
These things were the roots of wielding a sword, the fundamentals. He ought to learn them all, without letting a single one pass!
He was already beginning to regret it. Back then, he should not have rushed to kill that Sword Soul. He should have learned these sword techniques first, then gone in to challenge it, sword against sword, until he could defeat it without suffering so much as a scratch. That would have been real ability, real learning. Had he truly done that, his later battles would not have been so arduous.
I really did make a mistake. I should not have killed that Sword Soul! If a soul has awareness, whose home has it returned to?
...Beneath how many green lamps were the books scattered, into whose treasured casket did the sword pass?